Chief Justice Roberts bitch-slaps voters

I may not like the ruling, but I dig the smack talk.

It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.

Translation: You morons voted for Pelosi, Reid, and Obama. What did you expect?

Greenspan's Body Count: Michael Marin

Douchebagsayswhat?

Alan Greenspan is still concentrating his killing spree in the sand states.

Phoenix, Arizona:

A horrified court room looked on today as a man who had just been convicted of burning down his $3.5 million mansion collapsed and died in front of them.

Michael Marin, 53, was found guilty of arson by a jury in Maricopa County Superior Court. He appeared shocked and closed his eyes as the verdict was read before appearing to put something in his mouth and wash it down with liquid in a plastic water bottle.

[...]

Prosecutors claimed Marin set fire to his house in desperation because he could no longer pay the mortgage.

[...]

Marin, a father of four and grandfather of two, attended Yale Law School. He was an ex-Wall Street trader who enjoyed collecting art including Picasso sketches and described himself as a 'careful thrill seeker' to the Phoenix New Times after scaling Mount Everest and trips into the jungles of south-east Asian [sic].

Jackass. I'd love to climb Mt. Everest but I've got the little problem of paying my f-ing bills.

Greenspan's Body Count stands at 224.

HT: IP Freely.

UPDATE: LinkedIn:

The unforgettable fire.

Zillow: jackass paid $3.5 million, tacky mansion would now be worth $1.57 million. Lot just sold for $550,000.

Long jackass profile in the Phoenix New Times.

Marin added that "feeding the kitty month after month" — staggering $17,000-plus interest-only payments on the Biltmore home to private moneylenders, plus a mortgage at the Gilbert residence — was eating him alive financially.

And looming over Marin like an ugly storm cloud was a $2.3 million balloon mortgage payment on the Biltmore home, due in the coming month.

The Phoenix New Times story says the real sales price was $2.55 million, but it was inflated with some sketchy fake loan deal from a friend in order to inflate the appraisal price so he could get away with flipping it in a charity auction scam.

Takes one to know one: Marin self-published The Illustrated Field Guide to Morons.

Marin's primary residence, a more modest house at 438 E Vaughn Ave in Gilbert, was foreclosed in July 2010 and sold for $190,000 in December 2010.

Insiders got advance word on ObamaCare ruling

At 9:51 am EDT, a Wall Street brokerage firm sent out the message "health care stocks trading like the law will be upheld."

In the rigged stock market of America's centrally planned economy, those with access to the central planners have an advantage. If you're looking around the stock market and can't tell who the sucker is, it's you.

Expect an SEC investigation in about... never.

Chief Justice Roberts splits the baby on ObamaCare

Chief Justice says Congress doesn't have authority to mandate health care purchase under Commerce clause, so we'll just call it a tax.

The infinite expansion of the Commerce clause we feared didn't happen, and ObamaCare can be undone by a new Congress. But now Congress can apparently take away any right you have by just imposing a "tax."

How about a $100,000 tax for free speech?

UPDATE: Glass-half-full view from SCOTUSblog:

Lyle: The rejection of the Commerce Clause and Nec. and Proper Clause should be understood as a major blow to Congress's authority to pass social welfare laws. Using the tax code -- especially in the current political environment -- to promote social welfare is going to be a very chancy proposition.

Happy ObamaCare Overturn and Holder Contempt of Congress Day!

If I'm wrong about either of those outcomes, this allegedly constitutional republic is in far greater danger than I thought and it's time to start immediately working on your escape plan...

I still haven't told you about the warning of the Australian transplant to San Diego I met two years ago who had lived under dictatorships and was moving back to Australia to flee what he saw coming under the Obama regime... but that's a story for another day.

Obama-ese translation dictionary by Cliff Asness

... so non-liberals can understand what the hell he's talking about:

Some Useful Definitions to Understand Our Modern Progressive World

Failed Policies of the Past

Definition: Limited government, free markets, personal responsibility, liberty.

We Are All In This Together

Definition: For the love of God who do we tax back to the stone-age to get out of this!?

Social Darwinism

Definition: Essentially a darling concept of the progressive left of the first half of the 20th century (along with eugenics its even more vile cousin). It now is defined as "any attempt by conservatives and libertarians to rein in the unsustainable spending of out of control government."

Fairness

Definition: A word used to motivate making sure outcomes do not match abilities or effort. Note, pre-1970 it meant roughly the opposite.

Social Justice

Definition: Redistribution based on group affiliation, regardless of anything the actual individuals in question did, or even their specific ancestors did, but instead based on the actions of other individuals in the past who just kind of looked vaguely like those in the relevant groups being discussed now, both victim and oppressor. Also applies to redistribution of any kind, whether based on actual unfairness, or on simply outcomes liberals do not like.

Alternative definition: Unspecific. Just a meaningless phrase that screams “I am liberal and this phrase sounds liberal and nice with just a hint of revolutionary sexiness.”

Antonym: Justice (which, even if it must be applied broadly to address real group-wide wrongs, is always and everywhere an individual notion)

The Phrase “Deny Access to…”

Used in a sentence: “It is unfair to deny access to healthcare to 26 year olds living off their parents.”

Definition: When a person isn’t given something they want for free, and they have not found a way to steal it yet, they have been “denied access” to it. In general it is the “1%” that “denies access.” See “1%” below.

Entitlement

Definition: Something provided by other men and women’s labor that some claim as their right, sometimes claiming to have paid for it during their lifetime, when all forms of modern mathematics and accounting reject that notion.

Rights

Used in a sentence: “I have a right to healthcare.”

Definition: A more extreme form of “entitlement” defined above. Note that modern usage throws out the long tradition of natural rights only of a negative nature, that is, the right not to have something done to you, for rights of a positive nature, that is, the right to certain goods and services, like health care, Apple products, and soy milk. Since, no matter how important these items are, these modern positive rights must still be produced and taken from others, essentially the word “rights” now often stands for a system of slavery and theft.

Main Street

Definition: A place liberals used to ridicule as Mayberry but now pretend to love.

Regular Americans

Definition: People who support me.

Special Interests

Definition: People who support you.

Fat Cat

Definition: Something a politicians calls someone with 3x more money than the median voter who supported the politician in question.

Alternative Definition: Someone the same exact politician hits up for cash.

The 1%

Definition: Those who pay more than 1/3 the total federal income tax and are never thanked for it. More generally, they are responsible for all evil in the world today (unless they work in Hollywood or hi-tech in which case they are “honorary 99%-ers” regardless of income, tax rate, and lifestyle).

Middle-Class

Definition: A focus-group tested better word than “the poor” for progressives to use to advance their statist schemes. Some speeches by progressives now consist of just saying it over and over again in different hypnotic musical tones.

Income Inequality

Definition: What occurs when a free and productive economy includes people with different abilities, work habits, and, of course, luck. Also, one of the main reasons anyone actually works at anything.

A Fair Tax System

Definition: One in which the “rich” (i.e., those making more than the speaker of these words, or those voting for the speaker) pay 50% more than they currently pay, and the speaker and his constituents get to pay 50% less than they currently pay. These figures remain unchanged despite any starting tax rates. If this change pushes the “rich” to over 100% or the non-rich to below 0% more the fairer.

Julia

Definition: The person living the ideal progressive life where no responsibility is taken, no risk is taken, the government perks are endless, you never see who pays for it, and the tyrannical hand of big-brother never makes it into the cartoon narrative.

Synonym: Sheep Antonym: Men

Citizens United

Definition: The ultimate evil Supreme Court decision (narrowly defeating Dred Scott) which expanded free speech, thus allowing those with money to, uh, speak freely.

SCOTUS

Definition: A delicious breakfast treat that goes well with English Breakfast tea and clotted crème. Conservatives prefer theirs in the traditional 9 pack, liberals enjoy up to 15.

Elizabeth Warren

Definition: An “Elizabeth Warren” is any brilliant scholar who both thinks we can fix the U.S. financial system simply by adding another giant bureaucracy with near unlimited power, and who can, by dancing vigorously in a circle, make it rain. Both equally as likely.

The IMF and/or the World Bank

Definition: Nobody knows. See SMERSH and CHAOS for similar definitions.

The European Financial Crisis

Definition: A complex multi-year dance whose sole purpose is to see how much money can be shaken out of the German middle-class.

Universal Health Care

Definition: The system formerly known as single payer.

Single payer Health Care

Definition: The system formerly known as socialized medicine.

Socialized Medicine

Definition: Something Democrats claim they don’t want, as they simply want Universal Health Care.

Nobel Peace Prize

Definition: A prize awarded to the left’s favorite person that year.

Antonym: Any prize having anything to do with actual Peace, or frankly accomplishment of any kind.

Stimulus

Definition: Taking money from current and future Americans to undertake projects that didn’t make sense before, don’t make sense now, will net cost jobs as the stimulus must be paid for privately, but since the job losses will be hidden, and the direct hires put on the evening news, might let those in charge keep their cushy jobs a bit longer.

World War II

Definition: Mainly important as proof that Keynesian stimulus works (side note: also led to defeat of Nazis and Imperial Japan). Since it is the only such “proof” ever, and we all have nuclear weapons now, different options are being considered for future stimuli. Actually, since World War II ending did not crash the economy as Keynesians predicted at the time, frankly we’re rethinking the whole thing.

Cash for Clunkers

Definition: What we came up to replace World War II as stimulus. Many perfectly good cars destroyed, no Nazis defeated.

Quantitative Easing

Definition: The act of printing pieces of paper to purchase other pieces of paper and thinking it matters at all for anything. See “dogs chasing cars” for related examples.

Austerity

Definition: Spending much more than ever before but slightly less than you had once thought you might spend which itself was a completely insane amount to spend.

Synonym: Profligacy

Paul Ryan

Definition: A “Paul Ryan” is a Hollywood monster which kills and devours old people simply by showing them a preliminary reasonable plan to grow spending slower than we currently are, while keeping any obligations already made to the elderly.

Grand Bargain

Definition: An agreement to raise taxes now while tacitly agreeing to waive the corresponding spending cuts later. Usually done in at least a 10:1 ratio as waiving 10x the future cuts is a particularly effective amount of waiving.

Reform

Definition: To make something (e.g., government) bigger, more intrusive, less efficient, and more dictatorial.

Bipartisan

Definition: We found one old sap from the other party dying for one last shot at relevance who will add his name to our highly partisan effort.

Dodd-Frank

Definition: A verb, to “Dodd-Frank” something is to use the perpetrators of a major crime to fix things for next time. Like taking ex-computer hackers and putting them in charge of your security (this example is not perfect as this might actually work). Used in a sentence: “We really Dodd-Franked that financial reform.”

See also “Searching for the real killers.”

Right Wing Extremist

Definition: Someone objecting in any way to left wing extremism.

Conservative

Definition: Moron

Liberal

Definition: A word that when applied to yourself conveys an instant halo of goodness that does not have to be justified with actions, logic, or even the slightest examination of what the policies you support have wrought. Works particularly well for rich hypocrites (Wall Street) and rich morons (Hollywood).

Progressive

Definition: A rebranding of “liberal” post-Dukakis, going back to an older word, that means essentially the same thing, but contains the very positive word “progress” within it, and the always welcome “ive” ending.

Libertarian

Definition: A philosophy held by annoying bastards who happen to be right about nearly everything. Fortunately, due to the frustration that comes with being right about nearly everything, in a world wrong about those same things, there are only 19 of them, and we’re going to find the bastards soon.

The Party of No

Definition: Legislators who are rightly demonized by the press and progressives for being elected to bring down the size of government and then actually trying to do so. Sons of bitches.

Synonyms: Obstructionists, Do-nothing Congress

The Buck Stops There

Definition: Something Barack Obama says about George W. Bush.

Foreign Policy

Definition: A process where the USA makes amends to the rest of the world for being more successful than them, footing many of their bills, and shedding our blood to keep them safer and freer.

Due Process

Definition: Something progressives get misty over when Henry Fonda is being denied it on the silver screen and when in power they deliver at the end of an explosive drone after Judge David Axelrod pronounces the target guilty.

Climate

Definition: A non-linear chaotic system that is a near-perfect example of something that is very very difficult, even using modern methods, to explain or forecast. This in no way takes away from the possible reasonableness of man-made climate change described below. Though, one might note, we get frustrated by weathermen as they can’t forecast the climate today.

Global Warming

Definition: What we now call “climate change”. Global warming was phased out as it also leads to things being too cold, and sometimes being just right. Mama Bear has been replaced with a highly volatile mix of all three bears.

Climate Change

Definition: The fact that over time the climate, uh, changes.

Man-Made Climate Change

Definition: The entirely reasonable idea that seven billion industrialized humans may be affecting the climate.

Krypton Seven Seconds Before Kal-El Was Launched Into Space

Definition: The stage liberals are certain the Earth is at.

Jor-El

Definition: Both a character once played by Marlon Brando and coincidentally the fictional character Al Gore pictures himself as. Nobody listened to Jor-El and look what happened! A fascinating additional coincidence is that when Brando was alive, Marlon and Al alone actually omitted ¼ of the USA’s greenhouse gases.

Infinity

Definition: The amount progressives will spend to combat man-made climate change without any assessment of the costs and benefits of these actions.

The Green Agenda

Definition: The additional use of man-made climate change, even if it’s fully true and it makes economic sense to sacrifice to fight it, to have government and its anointed priests take over much more of our lives. Any questioning of it is absolute proof of evil. Children must be indoctrinated in it in grade school before reading or writing or arithmetic. They must then be sent to spy on and lecture their parents. Resistance is futile.

Ronald Reagan

Definition: Right wing extremist President who kicked people off welfare which progressives said would be a holocaust, radically broadened free trade which progressives say has since killed American manufacturing, and whose administration perpetuated the horrible banking deregulation progressives say brought on the financial crisis.

Bill Clinton

Definition: The guy who actually did those things right above (though Reagan did some other cool
things). Oddly today’s Democrats insist that it’s Republicans who’ve changed and gotten “way more extreme” since the 1990s.

Trickle Down Economics

Definition: A brilliant marketing phrase for denigrating the truth: that a freer economy helps everyone. Not to be confused with “trickle up poverty” a perfect definition of socialism.

Democracy

Definition: An excellent form of government where if you can cobble together 51% of the people, by promising them other people’s stuff, or scaring them that you’ll take away their stuff, you can rule as a dictator. It is decidedly not the form of government originally chosen by the United States of America, which is a constitutional republic with limited government. Thankfully we’ve mostly done away with that nonsense.

Socialism

Definition: A word that is a hate crime if used about an American politician who wants us to be more like Europe. Or, alternatively, a word used by many European politicians to define themselves.

Some judicious writing

What do Elmo, Roman Polanski, the Holocaust, and you have in common?

They're all covered in this missive from McDanger.

Canada mall collapse

ELLIOT LAKE, Ontario (AP):

Rescue teams and dogs searched through the rubble Sunday at a shopping mall in Canada where a roof collapsed through two floors, leaving several people missing and 22 people slightly injured.

This sounds like a job for Canadian search and rescue expert Celine Dion!



Take a kayak! Go into those walls! Those mothers over there, they're like Cheese Whiz!

Walmart 25% cheaper than Vons

... in a W.C. Varones survey of a sample basket of goods:

	Walmart	Vons
Loose carrots 1.72 lb	0.86	1.70
Yellow onion 3 lb bag	2.28	2.99	1
Banana 2.89 lb	1.68	1.99
Whole grain bread 24 oz	2.58	3.49	2
Black beans 2 cans – 19.75 oz	1.96	2.47	3
Yeast – Fleischmann's jar	4.24	6.99
Kikkoman soy sauce – 40 oz	5.08	6.99
Mission Tortillas – 10 pack large	2.34	2.99
Cheddar cheese – 16 oz	4.23	4.99
Almond Breeze almond milk	2.88	2.99
TOTAL	$28.13	$37.59

1 Vons organic, Walmart not 
2 20-ounce loaf $2.79 at Vons 
3 16-oz cans $1 at Vons

... and that's even with a lot of those items being on Vons Club Card specials. I'm amazed by the magnitude of the difference.

See the beautiful new Varonesville Walmart here.

MSM viewers finally learn about Fast and Furious

Viewers of mainstream broadcast and cable news first heard this week about what those of us in the blogosphere have known for a year: the Obama Justice Department put thousands of semi-automatic weapons into the hands of drug cartels, purportedly to see where the weapons turned up, but more likely to create an urgency to impose more gun control in America (e.g. "90% of all drug murders in Mexico are committed with US-sourced weapons! We have to do this for the Mexican children!"). And that those guns have gone on to be used to kill countless Mexicans and at least one US Border Patrol Agent. And that since then, the Justice Department has blatantly lied to Congress about the program and is still to this day not coming clean.

Can you imagine the year-round, 24-hour coverage we would have seen if the Bush Administration had done that?

A regular listener of state-sponsored propaganda radio network NPR mentioned Fast and Furious to me yesterday. It was the first time she had heard of it. She didn't catch the whole segment, but one thing that NPR made clear was that George Bush had done the same thing (oops, NOT TRUE!!!).

Well, the MSM don't-look-at-the-giving-guns-to-Mexican-drug-cartels-and-then-lying-about-it-and-stonewalling thing is falling apart.

John Stewart is left-leaning (he once described himself as a socialist), but he's got more journalistic integrity than all of mainstream print, broadcast, and cable "news" networks combined. And he is where Generation X and Y get their news. His take on Fast and Furious is long overdue... but spot-on.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Scott Walker is the new honey badger

We've treated you to the greatest Discovery Channel video before, the crazy nasty ass honey badger. Click on over and watch for a refresher if you don't recall.

Now check out this Scott Walker honey badger parody video:

Good advice

Barack Obama on executive privilege:

"There's been a tendency on the part of this administration to try to hide behind executive privilege every time there's something a little shaky that's taking place... and I think the administration would be best served by coming clean on this.... I think the American people deserve to know what was going on there."

HT: Beers with Demo

Fortnight for Freedom -- in defense of religious liberty

First they came for the Catholics, and I did not speak up because I was not a Catholic...



The W.C. Varones Blog stands squarely with American Catholics as they defend their religious liberty from unprecedented assault by the Obama regime.

Thanks to KT Cat for notifying me of this event at the historic Mission San Diego de Alcala -- California's first church.



It was the kickoff to a "Fortnight for Freedom."  Catholics will spend the next two weeks through July 4 working, praying, and spreading the word about the gross imposition of ObamaCare mandates against their religious beliefs.



The mission sanctuary was packed -- standing room only all the way to the back and spilling out into the parking lot.

The guy giving the opening welcome remarks led off with a passage from the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It only got more righteously indignant from there. From the Prayer for Freedom and Protection from Evil:

In that freedom, Lord, we your people live our lives
In a way that advances your Kingdom of Life,
And we refuse to cooperate in what is evil.

At this moment, therefore, when our government has decided
To force us to cooperate in evil,
We pray for the grace to be faithful to you
And to oppose the unjust laws and mandates
That have been imposed upon us and our institutions.

Strong words, but undeniably true.

The pastor from the evangelical Skyline mega-church, Jim Garlow, followed the opening remarks, and spoke of solidarity and devotion to truth and right in the face of coercion and wrong, including the story of Dietrich Bonhoeffer who was executed by the Nazis for resisting evil.  Garlow is quite a speaker.

I can't possibly do justice to what was said or how the audience enthusiastically responded to every reference to liberty and resisting tyranny.  I hope someone got it on video so you can watch for yourself.

We closed by singing America the Beautiful followed by God Bless America.





Find out more about Fortnight for Freedom nationally here and locally in San Diego here.

We are all Catholics tonight.

Generation X FAIL

The median Generation X household has spent the first half of their lives saving enough money to buy... one not particularly fully featured mid-range car!

What's 80 years old and says, "Would you like fries with that?"

Stupid is as stupid does: Matt Yglesias talks money

One wonders how a political partisan and philosophy major without the slightest understanding of finance got to write the "Moneybox" column at Slate.

And given that such a person was given the column, one would think the novice would have the good sense to refrain from saying exceedingly stupid things and exposing his ignorance.

One would be wrong.

Allow me to introduce Matt Yglesias, a longtime left-wing blogger and more recent mainstream media "progressive" columnist. Not only does Matt not have a clue what he's talking about, he launches baseless attacks on people who do know what they're talking about: in this case, eminent economics researchers Carmen Reinhart, Vincent Reinhart, and Kenneth Rogoff.

Yglesias doesn't like Reinhart, Reinhart, and Rogoff's recent NBER paper that shows that high debt levels depress future GDP growth.

Take it away, Matt:

National governments go into debt frequently, and some indebted states suffer growth slowdowns that mechanically increase their debt:GDP ratio. By contrast through what mechanism do these high debt levels cause slow growth? Or think of it this way. Japan has the highest debt:GDP ratio in the world. A huge share of that debt is owed to Japanese households. If a new patriotic fad swept the country in which Japanese households tore up their bonds and relieved their government of its debt obligations, would Japanese GDP growth be supercharged? How? Why? It seems mysterious. By contrast it's obvious that if Japanese growth were to be supercharged that Japan's debt:GDP ratio would fall. How could it not?

Um, no.

If a new patriotic fad swept the country in which Japanese households tore up their bonds and relieved their government of its debt obligations, would Japanese GDP growth be supercharged? How? Why?


If Japanese bond-holders tore up their bonds (or if Japan defaulted 100%), that would be a huge destruction of wealth for the private sector in Japan, and it would crush GDP and plunge Japan into a depression.  Not that such a fantasy is in any way relevant to the paper in the first place.

It seems mysterious.

Only to you, Philosophy Boy.

By contrast it's obvious that if Japanese growth were to be supercharged that Japan's debt:GDP ratio would fall. How could it not?


By contrast it's obvious that if monkeys flew out of my butt, my monkey:butt ratio would rise.  How could it not?

What does that have to do with anything?  Did you even read the paper, Matty?

Yglesias seems to believe, without providing any evidence, that debt is irrelevant and that deficit-fueled central planning can "supercharge" GDP growth, and that if high debt levels tend to be followed by sub-par growth, it can't possibly be that there's a causal relationship.  Never mind that Reinhart, Reinhart, and Rogoff give plenty of discussion to theoretical reasons for a causal relationship.  Matty doesn't even address any of them.


Yglesias' left-wing ally (and Journo-lister) Ezra Klein over at the Washington post, by contrast, had the good sense to keep his mouth shut and report on the story without opining.

Inland Empire: Rodney King found dead in his Rialto pool

LA riots figure Rodney King was found dead in his pool this morning at 1051 East Jackson Street in Rialto.

King's house was purchased in 2001 for $156,000. How does a man who won a $3.8 million settlement end up in the second-worst place in America? Why would a man predisposed to drug and alcohol problems choose to live in the #2 most depressing place in America? Anyone with anywhere close to $3.8 million should never set foot in the Inland Empire.

David Brooks goes Teabagging

David Brooks, the New York Times' house Republican, can be maddeningly obtuse, as when he writes poorly-researched hit pieces against conservatives.

But today's post is a gem. Brooks correctly identifies the Tea Party concerns (i.e. that infinitely expanding government and infinitely expanding debt are neither desirable nor sustainable), and while not explicitly aligning himself with that view, he gives it a sympathetic reading.

In America as in Europe, Republicans argue, the welfare state is failing to provide either security or dynamism. The safety net is so expensive it won’t be there for future generations. Meanwhile, the current model shifts resources away from the innovative sectors of the economy and into the bloated state-supported ones, like health care and education. Successive presidents have layered on regulations and loopholes, creating a form of state capitalism in which big businesses thrive because they have political connections and small businesses struggle.

The welfare model favors security over risk, comfort over effort, stability over innovation. Money that could go to schools and innovation must now go to pensions and health care. This model, which once offered insurance from the disasters inherent in capitalism, has now become a giant machine for redistributing money from the future to the elderly.

[...]

This is what this election is about: Is the 20th-century model obsolete, or does it just need rebalancing? Is Obama oblivious to this historical moment or are Republicans overly radical, risky and impractical?

Republicans and Democrats have different perceptions about how much change is needed. I suspect the likely collapse of the European project will profoundly influence which perception the country buys this November.

By the way, Brooks doesn't use the term "Tea Party" at all in the column, but ascribes these Tea Party views to Republicans in general. We've come a long way, baby.

Ruling class much?

Yes, that is an actual Obama ad, not a Saturday Night Live parody or a Romney PsyOps.

I'm beginning to smell a landslide.

Life of Julia vs. Life of Emily

Yes, I'm ridiculously late with this, as it's been all over the blogosphere, but I'll post it for my non-blog-junkie friends.

The Obama campaign created an ad about "Julia," portraying women as helpless and hopeless without big government handouts at every stage of their lives.

The Center for Freedom and Prosperity begs to differ.



War against women!

Greenspan's Body Count: Michael Chiantella

Still prowling the sand states, serial killer Alan Greenspan strikes in Venice, Florida:

Venice attorney Michael Chiantella died May 30 of an apparent suicide amid accusations of malpractice and the loss of more than $3 million in questionable investments.

Chiantella owed approximately $900,000 to one of his former clients, a Venice man who had sued him for malpractice over business deals that went sour.

A week before Chiantella's death, a $2.25 million claim in federal bankruptcy court was denied by a judge, meaning that Chiantella and others involved in the firm Marshall & Curry would not recover the money.

Court records show that Chiantella was swamped in debt and legal troubles for more than a year before his death.

[...]

Also licensed as a real estate and mortgage broker, Chiantella was providing investment advice and services to Venice resident Russell Cooke.

In his lawsuit, Cooke alleged that Chiantella had told him that his investment of about $500,000 was secured by mortgages on property when it was not, according to allegations in court records.

Cooke's lawsuit accused Chiantella of breaking conflict of interest rules by representing both Cooke and the person who was borrowing his money.

Chiantella later signed promissory notes pledging to repay the $900,000 — which included $348,000 that was lost in a Charlotte County mining venture.

At least he didn't kill the wife and kids like so many victims of Greenspan's bubbles do.

Greenspan's Body Count stands at 223.

Reason's Kennedy on Bath Salts, the Zombie Apocalypse, and Brain-Dead Senator Schumer

MSM smackdown

McDanger opines on Heroes, liars, and the media in the middle.

Greenspan's Body Count: James Butwin, Yafit Butwin, Malissa Butwin, Daniel Butwin, Matthew Butwin

Another sand state GBC:

Tempe businessman James Butwin carefully planned the final hours of his life, leaving behind detailed suicide notes before he killed his family and took his own life, according to Tempe police.

[....]

On Thursday, the Pima County medical examiner identified the charred remains of James and Yafit among the five bodies discovered in a burned-out SUV found in the Pinal County desert Saturday. Tempe police on Tuesday said two guns were found in the Ford, which belonged to the Butwin family. Authorities are still working to identify the children.

At the time of the deaths, James Butwin was negotiating with creditors over millions in debts, managing a divorce and battling a brain tumor, according to records and interviews with those who knew him.
[...]

Butwin, a commercial property developer who Tempe police say murdered his family within hours of his 47th birthday last week, had debts that had spiraled to more than $18 million as the Great Recession unraveled his business.

Butwin and his partners were negotiating a delinquent $18 million construction loan, sources familiar with the matter said. Though others shared in the debt, Butwin could have been on the hook for the entire amount if they failed to settle the debt.

Additionally, Butwin owed on a home-equity loan and another loan that collectively were worth $1.5 million.

Sure, you may say, his brain tumor may have contributed to his depression and its violent finale. But how often have you read about a dying cancer patient massacring his family compared to how often you've read about someone drowning in debt doing the same?

No contest. This is GBC all the way.

Greenspan's Body Count stands at 222.

Wisconsin

OMG it's a f'n blowout!

Walker up by 16 points with 1/3 of the vote in!  Sure, it may come in a little, but it will still be far wider than even the most optimistic polls, and far, far wider than the Walker-Barrett 2010 race.  In other words, the moderate-to-liberal voters of Wisconsin support Scott Walker much more after his union reforms than they did before!

This is a Waterloo of epic proportions for the unions.

As a great TelePrompTer reader once said, "This was the moment when the rise of the [unions] began to slow, and our [country] began to heal."



The sun sets on the union empire.

What to expect when you're expecting... an election

I meant to write a big post on this today but ran out of time. Check out the Liberator Today for thoughts on the meaning of tomorrow's election.

What I'm watching: Wisconsin, obviously. The second most important election this year. The polls are looking good for Gov. Walker to defeat the union machine. Let's hope they are right and he wins convincingly.

Locally in San Diego, Props A and B should win; it would be a huge financial and governmental setback if either failed.

For mayor, reformer Carl DeMaio will be in a runoff with either dinosaur Washington Democrat Bob Filner, or sleazy egomaniacal opportunist Nathan Fletcher. I'm rooting hard for the dinosaur. Soft-on-corruption DA Bonnie Dumanis is a distant fourth, and good riddance to her.

For County Supervisor, GOP frat boy Steve Danon is up against moderate Democrat Dave Roberts and HJTA conservative Carl Hilliard. I'd be happy with either Roberts or Hilliard, so would love to see Danon knocked out of the runoff. Not likely to happen, unfortunately, as the GOP good-ol-boy network is strong in San Diego.

Get out there and vote tomorrow! Check out my Tea Party Voters Guide if you have any questions.

UPDATE: A few other races I'm following: Schwarzenegger tax hike traitors Abel Maldonado and Anthony Adams in Calfornia Congressional Districts 24 and 8. Maldonado will probably get into the runoff and lose the general to Congresswoman Lois Capps in the Democratic district. Fat bastard Anthony Adams is running as an independent against numerous Republicans and two Democrats. I would love to see him blown out.

Finally, the Fullerton council recall of the council who covered up the police beating murder of homeless man Kelly Thomas. I think those guys are toast.

Greenspan's Body Count: Dennis and Merna Koula

Greenspan goes to Wisconsin:

Eric Koula’s 20-day trial for the 2010 shooting deaths of his parents begins today, when prosecutors will try to prove through a circumstantial case that he was motivated to kill.

The investigation is the largest in La Crosse County’s history with more than 15 local and state investigators dedicating hundreds of hours.

Much of the state’s case will focus on what prosecutors believe was the motive: The nearly broke West Salem day trader and heir to his wealthy parents’ estate killed them for the inheritance.

[...]

Koula called his parents’ home twice the day after they were killed to thank them for an anniversary present.

That same day, he deposited a forged $50,000 check drawn from his father’s investment account, reports stated.

Koula said his father gave him a blank check on May 20 when he stopped by his parents’ house for 10 minutes.

A financial expert determined Eric Koula was in debt and behind on his mortgage at the time, according to the complaint.

The next time somebody tells you he's a professional day trader, ask to see his tax return, which will document trading gains and losses. There's no such thing as a professional day trader. There are only trust fund babies who live off other assets while pretending to day trade for a living and getting their faces ripped off by high-frequency traders and Facebook IPOs.

Greenspan's Body Count stands at 217.

Jackin' It in San Diego

We've got the worst baseball team in the country, among the highest taxes and highest cost of living, 9% unemployment, and horribly underfunded pensions, but we've got one thing going for us.

Homeland Security Releases List of Watch Words

Over at GodfatherPolitics, we can see that the DHS has released its latest list of watch words. I have to assume that saying or emailing any of these words instantly puts you on their "Allowed to Bypass TSA Security Checks" list. And now, I'll attempt to get onto that very exclusive list by typing the word...."China"! Wow, that was awesome! Did I make it? What, no quotes allowed? Ok here's my 2nd attempt....China!

It took a Freedom of Information Act request and a lawsuit by the Electronic Privacy Information Center to get it, but Homeland Security has released its supposedly complete list of words that set off bells in the top secret caves of the DHS.

Among the obvious ones like Al Qaeda, terrorism and nuclear are some oddities like agriculture, incident, smart, Metro, snow and social media.

The keywords are included in the DHS’s Analyst’s Desktop Binder, which also instructs analysts to hunt down media reports that reflect poorly on the department.

Read more: http://godfatherpolitics.com/5390/homeland-security-releases-list-of-keywords-that-cheese-them-off/#ixzz1wYqUZcOv

 Media reports that reflect poorly on the TSA are "hunted down"? I'm glad that many of our smart, social media savvy, incident-avoidant, metro-sexual WC contributors are guilty of bad-mouthing the TSA (here, here, here, here, here, and here, for starters), because that means this summer we'll all be cruising by you schmucks as you wait in line to be nudie-scanned! "Ruling Class", here we come!